


It's Basic Textbook Knowledge

by Kamveeooch



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-21
Updated: 2014-06-21
Packaged: 2018-02-05 14:06:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1821097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kamveeooch/pseuds/Kamveeooch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fenris is very organized when it comes to school, keeping all of his books and binders in their assigned places. </p><p>Anders on the other hand, is not, and when he can't find a needed textbook for class the reluctant elf is forced to share.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Basic Textbook Knowledge

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this AO3 for years and never used it, so here I am. Giving it a go.
> 
> I'm pretty horrid at writing Anders, hehe.
> 
> Constructive criticism welcome!!
> 
> Based on this post from Tumblr: http://scamdal.tumblr.com/post/88764520133/before-writing-your-au-consider-the-following

Fenris was very organized when it came to his schoolwork. When he first came to public school from his homeschool he quickly learned that disorganization led to tardiness, which was not something he wished to be known for. So, he spent a few free periods organizing his entire locker and all his binders, giving everything its own space. He even went out of his way to buy a few locker stands, since all of his notebooks wouldn’t fit on the floor of the cramped metal box. He was proud of his work when he had finished, finding that it was much easier to maneuver his hectic high school schedule with his new outlook on organization.

Anders however had no such outlook.

The young mage refused to acknowledge his constant lateness and unpreparedness for classes, always brushing the teacher off. While Fenris could be quite rebellious himself, he was always one to be prepared and on time. When he asked Hawke about how the blonde could possibly manage to pass his classes the tall girl simply laughed.

“Anders doesn’t care about passing. In fact, he finds the whole education system ‘oppressive’ and ‘useless’,” she said, quoting his words with her fingers. Fenris scoffed.

“You’d think someone whom regards themselves with such prestige would care more about school,” and with that the elf had moved on.

It didn’t take long for Anders to regret his decisions, however.

One Tuesday during lunch (a lovely tray of rehydrated mashed potatoes, some still frozen peas, and a slice of ham that smelled of the pigsty it had come from) Anders slumped into his seat with a huff. Fenris tended to ignore the mage since when he didn’t he only found himself in a foul mood afterwards, but today the brooding of the human was worse than his own.

“What’s the problem, sweet cheeks?” Isabela asked from her seat across from him. All she got in reply was a rather rude huff.

“Aww, what’s got your knickers in a twist?” Hawke teased, shoving a fork full of ham into her mouth. Anders uncrossed his arms and leaned forward with another huff. Such a child.

“If you must know,” the mage began grumpily, “I’ve been informed that if I don’t start bringing my Biology text book to class I’ll receive a weeks’ worth of lunch detention! Can you believe the absurdity?”

“Why don’t you just bring you textbook to class then?” Fenris piped up, pushing his tray away from him. The stench was making him woozy.

“Well, I- er,” Anders faltered, looking down sheepishly.

“Let me guess, you’ve lost it in that trash heap you call a locker. I should have placed a bet on this when you offered, Isabela.” The elf teased. Isabela laughed off to his side, but he was too intent on putting the mage in his place.

“I haven’t lost it! I just refuse to obey such ridiculous rules.” Fenris could see his eye twitching in anger. It made him smirk proudly.

“Then where oh where is your precious textbook to be found?” Isabela chimed in, flicking one of the frozen peas off her plastic fork at Anders. It bounced off his nose, dropping to the ground.

“Oh, I know exactly where it is,” he scoffed, rubbing his nose.

“You didn’t answer the question, Anders!” Merrill pointed out, turning from her conversation with Hawke. This was starting to get more interesting than gossip about their history teacher’s love life.

“I-“ Anders spat out.

“Just admit you’ve got no clue where it is, mage,” Fenris shot back into the conversation, rolling his eyes. Anders threw his arms in the air like a fool.

“Alright fine, I’ve lost my blasted textbook are you all happy?” He sighed, plopping his head onto the table with a soft thud. Small giggles erupted from the rest of the table before attention quickly turned away from the subject and instead onto idle gossip. Fenris let the boy wallow in defeat for a good five minutes before clearing his throat to speak again.

“So, what do you intend to do, mage? I can’t say I’ll miss having lectures of mage rights spat into my ear for the upcoming week.”

“Don’t be foolish!” Anders’ head shot up, glaring at the elf. “I’ll just borrow someone else’s bloody textbook! So, would any of you be willing to lend me yours?”

A sudden hush fell over the table as the other students tried to look everywhere but at Anders.

“Oh, I see how it is! You’ll rush to help any freshman in need of saving from bullies but not your good pal Anders?” The boy looked offended, placing a hand over his heart as if to try and heal it.

“It’s not that Anders, it’s just,” Hawke looked to her fellow classmates, hoping for support. She received none. “None of us take Biology.”

“Oh Andraste’s tits, I’m doomed!” He cried out, slumping back in his chair and dramatically throwing an arm over his forehead.

“That’s not true!” Merrill said in a sing-song voice. “Fenris does!”

All eyes at the table turned to look at the elf who could feel the life slipping out of his body.

“No! No way am I sharing my textbook with this fool! He’ll lose it!” The elf glared, gesturing to the pleading mage.

“Oh, Fenris please! I won’t survive getting lunch detention again! You know what happened last time!” Anders begged, clasping his hands together and throwing together the most innocent face he could.

“Yes, you tried to jump out the window of a second floor room and ended up with _real_ detention!” Fenris shot back. “Don’t pull me into your ‘school is for pushovers’ act! I’ll end up back in homeschool with the Chantry breathing down my neck every minute!”

“Fenris.” Anders moved to the seat next to Fenris, leaning in close. The elf scrunched up his nose in disgust at the close proximity to the mage. “I swear on Ser-Pounce-A-Lot’s grave that I will return you your textbook every day after my class.” The blonde boy was giving him a very serious look that made the elf boy blush. Out of anger, of course. And embarrassment, he could hear Isabela and Merrill giggling.

“If I agree to this, will you get out of my face?” Fenris asked, shifting his gaze away from the intent stare he was receiving.

“Of course, just shake on it.” Anders held out his hand. Reluctantly, Fenris took it and shook twice.

After Anders had moved back to his seat beaming proudly at the others the white haired boy grimaced, wiping his hand on his pants.

“It’s a good thing I wasn’t planning on eating anymore of this slop,” he muttered.

 

The next day Fenris found himself staring at a tall mage instead of his locker. He sighed and trudged to the other, motioning for him to move out of the way.

“You remember our deal?” Anders questioned, holding his position.

“A quite one-sided one, but yes. Now move or neither of us will be prepared for class.” Anders stepped to the side, watching intently as the elf opened his locker and hung up his backpack on the hook in the back. He had always thought Fenris was a bit on the strange side, and his locker only furthered the mage’s opinion.

The top shelf neatly held a calculator, pencils and pens, and a water bottle, freshly place there by the short boy whom had to stand on his toes to set it up there. There were two shelves stacked on top of each other. The top held a few composition notebooks laid on their backs. The lower one was home to four binders, one labeled for each of the core subjects. On the bottom were three textbooks, stood vertically.

Anders bent down to reach for the biology book, only to have his hand smashed against the corner of the locker door by a certain boy’s leg.

“What in the Maker’s name was that for?” Anders hollered, pulling his hand back to rub it. He was still crouching on the dirty tiled floor, looking up angrily at the other.

“Have patience. I could just let you go to class without a textbook, you know.” Fenris pulled out his math binder before bending down to pull out the biology book, as well as a math one. “I expect it back by fourth period, I have science fifth. And don’t set it on fire, mage.”

“Right-oh good sir!” Anders saluted him mockingly and pranced off. Fenris rolled his eyes, shutting his locker and heading to math class.

 

Anders was waiting by Fenris’s locker between third and fourth period, smiling brightly. “Here you are Fenris, one biology textbook.” The mage held the book out as Fenris expertly turned the dial on his locker, popping it open.

“I see it’s in one piece as well. I’m surprised.” He took the book and stashed it neatly onto the metal floor.

“Your views on mages are very black and white, aren’t they elf?” Anders asked, turning to walk to his next class.

“For good reason,” Fenris mumbled in reply, though he didn’t think the mage would hear him.

 

When Fenris sat down in science and opened his textbook to the page instructed he half expected lightning to shoot out of it. Instead he found the messy scrawl of the mage cluttering the corner of the page.

_“Pop quiz after bell ringer – hope you studied meiosis!”_

The elf glared at the writing, trying to figure out why the mage wouldn’t just tell him when he saw him if it was so important. He did however turn back a few pages to brush up on the processes of meiosis, and he was glad he did. The pop quiz was more of a challenge than he expected, and probably wouldn’t have passed had he not don’t some quick studying right before.

At the end of class Fenris glanced at the writing in his textbook again and quickly scribbled a reply underneath it.

_“Perhaps you are good for something.”_

 

The notes continued throughout the year, and everyday Fenris found himself looking forward to them more and more. It was foolish to feel such a thing, but no one had to know he felt that way.

Most of the time it was Anders warning him about something their teacher was about to do, but gradually more started to show up. There’d be horrid puns using terms they learned in class, questions about the lesson for Fenris to answer, and even a few polite conversations thrown in the mix. Fenris found himself talking to the mage through his textbook more than he did face-to-face; giving him the answers to the homework that was due at the end of the week, wondering if Isabela and Merrill were and item, he had even asked about the mage’s day once. (It was fine, but he had run out of cat food that morning and had to give his cats his breakfast so he was starved. Fenris shared a bit of his lunch with him that day.)

Then, one day when Fenris was reviewing some of the earlier chapters in the book when he noticed something quite out of the ordinary. It was obviously a note from Anders, he wouldn’t mistake that messy handwriting for anyone else’s, but the words were quite out of character. Fenris felt his ears grow warm, his cheeks and nose soon following.

_“I think you’re quite cute, actually. Isabela’s flirting is well deserved, but I hope you don’t reciprocate her advances…”_

How long ago had this been written? Was this some sort of ruse to embarrass the white haired boy? Surely not, the mage wasn’t that bad of a person.

Fenris couldn’t stop thinking about the short sentences for the rest of the day. His friends took notice to this unusually distant self at lunch. Well, more distant than usual.

“Fenris, baby, what’s bothering that sweet little head of yours?” Isabela cooed. Fenris looked from where his eyes had been glued to the white wall with a start, glancing over to the others before taking a bite out of a ketchup-covered French fry.

“It’s none of your concern, Isabela. I’m just reviewing biology for the test this Friday.”

“Test? What test? We don’t have a test this Friday, if we did I’d be begging the Maker that I somehow pass.” Anders said, looking at the boy questioningly. Fenris simply shrugged, popping another French fry into his mouth. They were dry and needed a lot of ketchup. Unfortunately, the ketchup was rather dry as well.

“Perhaps you should review the past chapters, mage. That is, if you wish to pass.” Anders groaned, making a rather unattractive face, which was unusual for him. He was usually quite attractive, even Fenris could admit this. “Would you like to borrow my textbook tonight, to study?”

“Would you do that for me, Fenris? You’d help out an abomination like that?” Anders asked, only half joking.

“There’s a first time for everything,” the elf stated before going back to staring at the wall, only stealing a few glances at the mage in front of him.

 

At the end of the day Fenris found Anders at his locker, blocking his way yet again. This time however, when he saw the shorter boy approach he stepped out of the way politely. Fenris popped open his locker and pulled out the textbook, handing it to Anders.

“You’re sure you don’t need it to study?” Anders asked, tucking it under his arm.

“I’ll be fine, mage. You should worry about yourself. How someone who wishes to become a healer can be so bad at biology truly baffles me.” Anders laughed; it was quite a sweet laugh.

“Be sure to study the chapter on decomposers, you’re awful when it comes to fungus.” Anders put on a mock look of being offended, but thanked the elf again.

“I’ll see you tomorrow then!” He waved, heading off.

Fenris stuffed the rest of his binders into his backpack, trying to hide his smile.

 

The next day Fenris didn’t expect to see Anders at his locker, since he already had the textbook. When the blonde boy was standing there, fidgeting slightly, he quirked an eyebrow and walked over.

“You have the textbook, what do you need me for?” He asked, waiting patiently for the mage to step out of his way.

“Well you see, I was studying away last night like a good student when I noticed something rather intriguing, that I thought you should know about for the ‘test’.” Fenris cocked his head to the side, a silent word for the mage to continue. Anders smirked, but said nothing.

Sighing, Fenris urged; “What is it mage, I have little time to waste on your rambli-“ Fenris froze when Anders pressed a quick kiss to his nose, chuckling.

“I read that not only does a certain white haired elf not have a crush on a certain girl who cheats at cards, but in fact he much more enjoys the company of a certain mage,” Anders mocked, handing Fenris the text book. Fenris chuckled softly, tossing it into his locker without a care of where it went.

He stood on his toes, wrapping his arms around the mage’s neck. Leaning in towards his ear he whispered,

“I’m glad you at least learned something in that dreadful class,” and smashed their lips together.

 

Perhaps he should share more than his textbook with the mage.


End file.
